


one hundred miles(is not a long way)

by Fightingandwriting



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Americans, MWPP, Marauders, Multi, Road Trip, jily, muggle appliances, references to past abuse, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-21 16:38:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17646419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fightingandwriting/pseuds/Fightingandwriting
Summary: In which happy endings might be impossible to find, but hopeful endings are a little easier. Or, in which Sirius' muggle studies OWL finally comes in handy, James doesn't know how to use snapchat, Peter can't believe how bad his friends are at muggle existence, and Remus tries to figure out whether he loves or hates Sirius' inability to think for even a moment before making a decision.(Or, in order to save Britain from Voldemort, the marauders have to take a road trip through America. To avoid being caught by Death Eaters immediately, they also have to pretend to be muggles. It goes about how you would expect.)





	one hundred miles(is not a long way)

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! So, quick note before reading this--this chapter is supposed to make sense. As in, it's not supposed to be particularly cryptic or anything. So basically, if there's anything you're confused about, imaginary person reading this, let me know in the comments, and I'll try to clear it up. Thanks for reading!

Andromeda stands on her front porch, positioning her body between her cousin and the door to her house. She trusts him more than she trusts nearly anyone else, which is why she asked him here, but people are not always who they claim to be, these days.

 

“Why did you run away?” she asks.

 

“Merlin, Andy, that’s the best question you could come up with to make sure I’m me?” Sirius Black asks. She doesn’t budge. It is the best question she could have come up with, and they both know it; anyone using Sirius’ appearance will make it perfectly clear that they are not him when they answer. 

 

Sirius sighs. “At some point, you’ve lost, and there’s no point fighting anymore.” He takes a breath before looking back up at her, as though what he just said means nothing, as though it isn’t the very thing that has defined the latter half of both their lives. “Can I come inside now? It’s fucking freezing out here.” 

 

The muggle curse still sounds strange, coming from Sirius, but Andromeda supposes she must sound the same way, when she uses Ted’s words. She moves, lets him into her house, closes the door behind them.

 

When she turns around, Sirius has already made himself comfortable, sitting on one of her kitchen counters with his feet swinging against the cabinet below.

 

“I like the new wallpaper, Andy. It really brings out my eyes. Also, what’s going on? Your message sounded important. ” He looks at her, a serious expression hiding behind his humor. 

 

His voice gives away none of his upbringing, no indication that he was once, maybe still is, a Black. She would think that was almost a Slytherin trait, to be able to remold his language to mirror that of his friends so completely, if she didn’t know how entirely  _ Gryffindor _ he is. Because she does know he’s as Gryffindor as they come, she supposes it must not have been intentional. He might not even know how  _ common _ he sounds. 

 

She kind of likes it. Thinks, she might be a little jealous. She had to work to get rid of her magical-nobility accent. 

 

She looks at him, his feet still knocking against her nice, white cabinets, and takes a breath. “I need your help.” Distantly, she can hear a voice in her head telling her  _ Blacks don’t ask for help _ . She thinks, there’s a reason she’s not a Black anymore.

 

Sirius, being the complete Gryffindor that he is, just shrugs. “Ok. What do you need?”

 

“It’s Order business,” she says, watching to see if anything in his expression changes. It doesn’t.

 

“Why haven’t I heard of it?” Sirius asks, and sometimes she can’t believe that he’s of age now, that he’s in the Order. Merlin, she’s getting old.

 

“You haven’t heard of it because Dumbledore doesn’t tell people things,” she says. Dumbledore’s go-to seems to be secrets, asking people to die for a cause he will not explain. She understands, sometimes: Blacks are no strangers to lies. But there is, after all, a reason she left, a reason Sirius left. And so sometimes, she understands Dumbledore’s need for secrets, but still wants to scream  _ I thought this would be different _ , wants to say  _ I died for this at sixteen, and so did Sirius, and you could have saved both of us if you were valued people over secrecy. _

 

Perhaps, her dislike of Dumbledore goes beyond the way he runs the Order.

 

She looks at Sirius, who seems to almost curl in on himself at the mention of Dumbledore, and she remembers the way he had begged to be switched to Slytherin in first year. Remembers how Dumbledore had never figured out why Sirius wanted to be switched so badly--except, sometimes it seems painfully obvious that Dumbledore did, that Dumbledore must have known exactly what happened when Sirius went home. When she went home. 

 

Perhaps they both dislike Dumbledore for things that can never be forgiven.

 

Andromeda shakes her head to bring herself back to the present. “There’s a spy in the Order,” she says, and Sirius’ expression goes slack.

 

“What?”

 

There is. She doesn’t know who, but someone who should be loyal is not. “Someone is going to betray us, and right now, that cannot happen.”

 

“What?” Sirius asks, still staring at her. She sighs.

 

“There’s this...artifact. Dumbledore found it recently, just before the Death Eaters got to it. If they get it, it’s all over.”

 

“That sounds...bad,” Sirius says uncertainly.

 

“Yes,” Andromeda says. “The current plan is for me to keep it. But, there’s a spy in the Order.”

 

Sirius suddenly seems to get it. There’s a reason, Andromeda thinks, that everyone says he’s so smart. “So you can’t keep it here, because the Death Eater’s will figure out you have it, and then they’ll come get it. Which is why Nymphy and Ted aren’t here?”

 

“They’re at Ted’s parents’ place.” Can’t have a ten year old around the house when you’ve made yourself into bait. “So will you do it?”   
  


“Andy, I don’t speak Slytherin.” It’s been a running joke between them for years, that Slytherins speak mostly in the unsaid, say more in silence than in sound. “Can you maybe explain in, like, actual words this time?”   
  


Andromeda sighs. “Magical artifact from the fourth century. It’s--” She’s not sure how one explains something like this.  _ I don’t speak Slytherin _ , but Andromeda doesn’t speak Gryffindor, doesn’t know how to explain something like this in a forthright kind of way, in an honest, to the point explanation that will make any kind of sense. She looks at Sirius for a moment. “Did you ever learn about our ancestors?”

 

“Yeah,” Sirius says. “This...thing, it has to with them?”   
  


Andromeda takes a breath. “Or, people like them. I don’t really know, would know more if Dumbledore bothered to explain anything, but, Voldemort is not the first person to want to destroy the muggles. Someone tried before, created this  _ thing _ that can kill a horrific number of people at once, and...it’s been lost, since then. I imagine someone who didn’t actively want to kill the majority of human beings got to it, hid it somewhere until now.”

 

Sirius looks at her blankly. “So it’s like a genocide cube.”

 

“Actually, it’s more like a sphere,” Andromeda says, touching her wand. The blue ball appears on the counter next to Sirius, who yelps and slides backwards.

 

“You actually  _ have _ it. Wow. Ok. Wow. Um, why can’t you just use this to kill Voldemort?”

 

It’s a valid question. “It’s meant for genocide, like you said. You have to be willing to kill hundreds of people to use it. It’s kind of clever, actually: only someone who wants to destroy all muggles could ever be willing to kill the kind of numbers this thing requires.”

 

“Wouldn’t have to be muggles,” Sirius mutters. Andromeda looks at him.

 

“What?”   
  


“Oh, nothing, just muggle studies stuff. Blood purists aren’t the only people to want genocide.” Sirius shrugs. “Anyways, so: murder cube--sorry,  _ blue murder orb _ , you need someone to hide it, and you want...me?”

 

“I don’t want you to hide it,” Andromeda says. “I want you to destroy it. There’s someone in America who could do that.” 

 

“So I just need to apparate to America, find them, and have them destroy this? Problem solved?”

 

“Not exactly.” Slytherins don’t hesitate, but Andromeda is not entirely sure how to ask this. “Magic leaves a trace, right? Something like this is powerful enough that as soon as you leave the country, the Death Eaters will know immediately. So…”

 

“So we’re screwed.”

 

“No. So you need leave your wand here. Take a muggle--plane, I think? To America, get some sort of in-land muggle transportation, and find the person who can destroy it. Death Eaters’ aren’t tracking muggle movements, and if you use no other magic, this thing won’t show up on their radar.”

 

Sirius stares at her, and she thinks he is going to say no. Then he shrugs, says, “Ok.” Pauses. “Sure. I can put my muggle studies into use. Two questions, though. Why me, and do I have to go alone?”

 

God bless Gryffindors.

 

“I’m asking you because I know I can trust you,” she says, and he seems to think on that for a moment before nodding. It’s not because they share a bloodline; they both know that means nothing. It’s that, given a choice between the Order and their family, she knows Sirius will choose the Order every time. “And, because--” this, this is harder to say.  _ Slytherins don’t hesitate _ . “And because you can take a crucio, if it comes down to it.”

 

She watches as Sirius processes her words, as he seems to become smaller, somehow, and she can’t help but think about seeing him at Grimmauld Place, about the way he would make himself as small as possible while he was in that house. Making himself a smaller target, she thinks, and, well. She would know.

 

Sirius doesn’t speak for a moment, and if he were anyone else, she would assume he was looking for a way to back of this thing he’d agreed to. After all, she had just told him that there was a good chance he would be tortured for doing this. But with Sirius, she got the sense that he was just lost in memories, and that was not a good place, for him, for her.

 

“Sirius,” she says, not gently but not unkindly either. He looks up, looks down again. 

 

“Yeah,” he says. Takes a breath. “Alright.” Breathes in and out one more time. “I’m good. Kind of hoped you didn’t know about that, but, it happens. Ok. So, I guess I shouldn’t bring my friends.”

 

Andromeda looks at him. Thinks about what she’s asking him to do. “No,” she says. “Bring them. You have a better chance together. Look, I know Blacks don’t ask for help, but you have a better chance if you ask them. And besides, there’s a reason we both left.” She says the only thing she knows is certain to get him to listen, because she suddenly can’t stand the thought of him doing this alone. “Just...Here. Use a Fidelius charm on the artifact, make yourself the secret keeper, keep it with you at all times. And, if you can, don’t tell them everything. Don’t tell them I gave it to you. They won’t be in danger--who am I kidding, everyone is in danger, but this, this is worth it.”

 

He nods, and Andromeda cannot believe he is going to do this. Guilt is not a Slytherin quality, but she can’t help but wish that the war had not brought them here, that she was not asking her eighteen year old cousin to do what even Dumbledore will not.

  
_ Gryffindors _ . Of course he said yes. As Sirius walks out of her house later that evening--she makes him dinner first, god, she has some manners--she almost wants to call him back, to say,  _ no, don’t do it, you’re going to get killed. _ But she thinks, he will also get killed if he doesn’t do this. They all will. So she wishes he didn’t have to fight, because to her, he will always be her five year old cousin who fell up the stairs at her fourteenth birthday party, but sometimes you don’t have a choice. This is war, after all.


End file.
